9780300097139

The Complete Poems of John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester

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  • ISBN13:

    9780300097139

  • ISBN10:

    0300097131

  • Format: Trade Paper
  • Copyright: 2002-11-10
  • Publisher: Yale University Press
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Summary

John Wilmot, the notorious Earl of Rochester, was the darling of the polished, profligate court of Charles II. One of the finest poets of the Restoration, patron to important playwrights, model for countless witty young rakes in Restoration comedies, he lived a full but short life, dying in 1680 (with a dramatic deathbed renunciation of his atheism) at the age of thirty-three. This edition of Rochester's poetry, brilliantly annotated and introduced by David M. Vieth, has been a classic work for decades. Rochester had many admirers: Graham Greene wrote Lord Rochester's Monkey; Daniel Defoe quoted him often; Tennyson recited his poems; Voltaire admired his satire for 'energy and fire'; Goethe could quote him in English; and Hazlitt said that 'his verses cut and sparkle like diamonds' and that 'his contempt for everything that others respect almost amounts to sublimity'. Book jacket.

Author Biography

David M. Vieth was professor of English at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale

Table of Contents

Preface xiii
Introduction xvii
Rochester's Life xvii
Rochester's Poetry xxxiii
This Edition xlii
Rochester Studies 1925--1967 lii
Prentice Work (1665--1671)
Song
3(1)
(`Twas a dispute' twixt heaven and earth)
A Pastoral Dialogue between Alexis and Strephon
4(3)
(There sighs not on the plain)
A Dialogue between Strephon and Daphne
7(3)
(Prithee now, fond fool, give o'er)
Song
10(1)
(Give me leave to rail at you)
A Song
11(1)
(Insulting beauty, you misspend)
A Song
12(1)
(My dear mistress has a heart)
Song
12(1)
(While on those lovely looks I gaze)
Song
13(1)
(At last you'll force me to confess)
Woman's Honor
14(1)
(Love bade me hope, and I obeyed)
The Submission
15(1)
(To this moment a rebel, I throw down my arms)
Written in a Lady's Prayer Book
16(1)
(Fling this useless book away)
The Discovery
17(1)
(Celia, the faithful servant you disown)
The Advice
18(2)
(All things submit themselves to your command)
Under King Charles II's Picture
20(1)
(I, John Roberts, writ this same)
Rhyme to Lisbon
20(1)
(A health to Kate)
Impromptu on Louis XIV
21(1)
(Lorraine you stole; by fraud you got Burgundy)
Rochester Extempore
22(1)
(And after singing Psalm the Twelfth)
Spoken Extempore to a Country Clerk after Having Heard Him Sing Psalms
22(1)
(Sternhold and Hopkins had great qualms)
To My More Than Meritorious Wife
23(1)
(I am, by fate, slave to your will)
Letter from Miss Price to Lord Chesterfield
24(1)
(These are the gloves that I did mention)
The Platonic Lady
25(1)
(I could love thee till I die)
Song
26(1)
(As Chloris full of harmless thought)
Song
27(4)
(Fair Chloris in a pigsty lay)
Early Maturity (1672--1673)
Song
31(1)
(What cruel pains Corinna takes)
Song
32(1)
(Phyllis, be gentler, I advise)
Epistle
33(1)
(Could I but make my wishes insolent)
Sab: Lost
34(1)
(She yields, she yields! Pale Envy said amen)
Two Translations from Lucretius
34(1)
(Great Mother of Aeneas, and of Love)
(The gods, by right of nature, must possess)
35(1)
To Love
35(2)
(O Love! how cold and slow to take my part)
The Imperfect Enjoyment
37(3)
(Naked she lay, clasped in my longing arms)
A Ramble in St. James's Park
40(6)
(Much wine had passed, with grave discourse)
On the Women about Town
46(2)
(Too long the wise Commons have been in debate)
Song
48(1)
(Quoth the Duchess of Cleveland to counselor Knight)
The Second Prologue at Court to ``The Empress of Morocco,'' Spoken by the Lady Elizabeth Howard
49(2)
(Wit has of late took up a trick t' appear)
Song
51(1)
(Love a woman? You're an ass)
Upon His Drinking a Bowl
52(1)
(Vulcan, contrive me such a cup)
Grecian Kindness
53(1)
(The utmost grace the Greeks could show)
Signior Dildo
54(6)
(You ladies all of merry England)
A Satyr on Charles II
60(5)
(I' th' isle of Britain, long since famous grown)
Tragic Maturity (1674--1675)
Timon
65(8)
(What, Timon! does old age begin t' approach)
Tunbridge Wells
73(8)
(At five this morn, when Phoebus raised his head)
Upon His Leaving His Mistress
81(1)
('Tis not that I am weary grown)
Against Constancy
82(1)
(Tell me no more of constancy)
Song (early version)
83(1)
(How happy, Chloris, were they free)
To a Lady in a Letter (final version)
84(1)
(Such perfect bliss, fair Chloris, we)
Song
85(1)
(Leave this gaudy gilded stage)
The Fall
86(1)
(How blest was the created state)
The Mistress
87(1)
(An age in her embraces passed)
A Song
88(1)
(Absent from thee, I languish still)
A Song of a Young Lady to Her Ancient Lover
89(1)
(Ancient person, for whom I)
Love and Life
90(1)
(All my past life is mine no more)
Epilogue to ``Love in the Dark,'' As It Was Spoke by Mr. Haines
91(3)
(As charms are nonsense, nonsense seems a charm)
A Satyr against Reason and Mankind
94(8)
(Were I who to my cost already am)
Fragment
102(2)
(What vain, unnecessary things are men)
A Letter from Artemisia in the Town to Chloe in the Country
104(9)
(Chloe, in verse by your command I write)
A Very Heroical Epistle in Answer to Ephelia
113(3)
(If you're deceived, it is not by my cheat)
The Disabled Debauchee
116(2)
(As some brave admiral, in former war)
Upon Nothing
118(2)
(Nothing! thou elder brother even to Shade)
An Allusion to Horace, the Tenth Satyr of the First Book
120(9)
(Well, sir, 'tis granted I said Dryden's rhymes)
Disillusionment and Death (1676--1680)
Dialogue
129(1)
(When to the King I bid good morrow)
To the Postboy
130(2)
(Son of a whore, God damn you! can you tell)
On the Supposed Author of a Late Poem in Defence of Satyr
132(2)
(To rack and torture thy unmeaning brain)
Impromptu on Charles II
134(1)
(God bless our good and gracious King)
Impromptu on the English Court
135(1)
(Here's Monmouth the witty)
The Mock Song
136(1)
(I swive as well as others do)
On Cary Frazier
137(1)
(Her father gave her dildoes six)
On Mrs. Willis
137(2)
(Against the charms our ballocks have)
Song
139(1)
(By all love's soft, yet mighty powers)
Epilogue to ``Circe''
140(1)
(Some few, from wit, have this true maxim got)
On Poet Ninny
141(1)
(Crushed by that just contempt his follies bring)
My Lord All-Pride
142(2)
(Bursting with pride, the loathed impostume swells)
An Epistolary Essay from M. G. to O. B. upon Their Mutual Poems
144(4)
(Dear friend, I hear this town does so abound)
Epigram on Thomas Otway
148(1)
(To form a plot)
Answer to a Paper of Verses Sent Him by Lady Betty Felton and Taken out of the Translation of Ovid's ``Epistles,'' 1680
149(1)
(What strange surprise to meet such words as these)
A Translation from Seneca's ``Troades,'' Act II, Chorus
150(5)
(After death nothing is, and nothing, death)
Poems Possibly by Rochester
To His Sacred Majesty, on His Restoration in the Year 1660
155(1)
(Virtue's triumphant shrine! who dost engage)
In Obitum Serenissimae Mariae Principis Arausionensis
156(1)
(Impia blasphemi sileant convitia vulgi)
To Her Sacred Majesty, the Queen Mother, on the Death of Mary, Princess of Orange
157(2)
(Respite, great Queen, your just and hasty fears)
A Rodomontade on His Cruel Mistress
159(1)
(Trust not that thing called woman: she is worse)
Against Marriage
159(1)
(Out of mere love and arrant devotion)
A Song
160(1)
(Injurious charmer of my vanquished heart)
Epigram on Samuel Pordage
161(1)
(Poet, whoe'er thou art, God damn thee)
On Rome's Pardons
161(2)
(If Rome can pardon sins, as Romans hold)
Works Cited by Cue Titles in the Notes 163(6)
Notes on the Texts, Authorship, and Dates of the Poems 169(52)
First-Line List of Poems Omitted from This Edition 221(18)
Indexes
First-Line Index to the Poems
239(8)
Index of Persons
247

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